I know what you're saying...crazy woman has disappeared from her blog and now she comes back with not a recipe but a "reader" story. Tsk, Tsk, she's gone coo coo for cocoa puffs.
Oh yeah, Google Reader is gone as of tomorrow people and true to my word I am using it to the bitter end. I have signed up and tested out way too many reader replacements out there and participated in emotionally charged discussions over replacement options and have FINALLY settled on my choice. It was with much thought and finally the opinion of what I refer to as an "expert" (a friends husband whom I worked with and works for Apple). I have a MacBook Pro and I figure someone who works for Apple ought to have a pretty darn tootin' good idea of what reader I should consider plus he's purty darn smart you know cause he married my friend and all!!!
Anywho, my front runner was Feedly and now it is the definite winner. I've finally got my views and settings customized in a way that makes me happy, happy, happy. The only option google offered that I'm not finding in Feedly is the search but I figure I'll live and I've taken the time to add that to the requested enhancements on their site. Remember just like in elections, if you don't vote you don't get the right to complain!!
If you aren't exactly sure what a reader can do for you, this is the Wikipedia definition for you:
RSS Rich Site Summary (originally RDF Site Summary, often dubbed Really Simple Syndication) is a family of web feed formats used to publish frequently updated works—such as blog entries, news headlines, audio, and video—in a standardized format.[2] An RSS document (which is called a "feed", "web feed",[3]or "channel") includes full or summarized text, plus metadata such as publishing dates and authorship.
RSS feeds benefit publishers by letting them syndicate content automatically. A standardized XML file format allows the information to be published once and viewed by many different programs. They benefit readers who want to subscribe to timely updates from favorite websites or to aggregate feeds from many sites into one place.
RSS feeds can be read using software called an "RSS reader", "feed reader", or "aggregator", which can be web-based, desktop-based, or mobile-device-based. The user subscribes to a feed by entering into the reader the feed's URI or by clicking a feed icon in a web browser that initiates the subscription process. The RSS reader checks the user's subscribed feeds regularly for new work, downloads any updates that it finds, and provides a user interface to monitor and read the feeds. RSS allows users to avoid manually inspecting all of the websites they are interested in, and instead subscribe to websites such that all new content is automatically checked for and advertised by their browsers as soon as it is available.
I have many blogs, sites, news, etc. that I follow on a daily basis, or at least try to check daily, and rather than bookmarking and going to each site individually I have a reader feed that compiles them all to one location and from there I can scan and read several hundred in a matter of minutes. Feedly gives me several options of how I want to see them; titles only (like Google Reader), magazine (my current choice), cards and full articles. I'm actually finding that I like this view better than titles only. I know shock and dismay, right??!!
Well peeps I'm just here to remind you that tonight at midnight Google Reader is gone, adios, ta ta , bye bye, sayonara, arrivederci, farewell and RIP so if you haven't made up your mind, you've got a few hours until then I'm off to enjoy my last day of Google Reader and hopefully I'll be back tomorrow with something food related!!!
What did you peeps decide to use or are you still lurking in the shadows hoping Google will change their mind?
Talk to me peeps!!!
